Audiobooks are fun. They are perfect driver companions. They make every long trip much shorter – and much more entertaining. They let you enjoy the story together with other members of your family or friends.

Most importantly, audiobooks allow you to follow the plot when you wouldn’t be able to read. For instance, if you are cooking dinner or jogging in the morning. Or if you are on a long trip – and you are a driver.

Narrator’s voice helps better imagine characters, interactions, and places in the book. The voice can create an addictive and memorable mood – something you would love to come back to over and over again.

For people who better learn from what they hear that read, audiobooks are a natural learning tool. Others, who get easily distracted when reading a book, can be surprised to discover that an audiobook keeps them focused for long hours!

In the list below, you will find major facts about audiobooks, accompanied by tips and useful links. This guide will be helpful for anyone who wants to give a try to audiobooks and is ready to spend some time to find tips and answers to most essential questions.

What’s the best tip for audiobook newbies? If you own an iOS or Android phone, make sure to download one of the free audiobook apps, and start listening to your first audiobook in a matter of seconds!

Explore the most popular audiobook bestseller lists: the New York Times, Publishers Weekly, Audible, Google Play, Scribd, Nook, and Kobo.

Audiobooks – facts and tips

Audiobooks are more expensive than ebooks

People who started buying ebooks are used to prices that are lower – sometimes considerably lower – than print editions. What’s more, there are several deals on ebooks, which enable users to get favorite titles at prices cut to a range between $0.99 and $2.99.

Users expect audiobooks to work the same way. Audiobooks are also books in a digital format, so there is no cost of printing, right?

Yes, but there is another cost-generating factor. It’s narration.

An average novel contains 80,000 words. It translates to about 9-10 hours of narration. The cost per finished hour ranges between $100 and $500. So, the cost of producing an audiobook of a 100,000-word novel narrated by a recognized voice can easily exceed $5,000.

It’s no surprise that an audiobook version of a book title costs much more than its ebook edition. In most cases, it’s also more expensive than a paperback or even hardcover.

The usual price of an audiobook edition is between $20 and $30. It’s twice as much as the cost of a Kindle or paperback edition. Both formats are usually priced below $20.

Don’t expect deep deals on audiobooks

As you’ve seen in the table above, regular prices of Kindle editions of popular books usually cost between $4.99 and $15.99.

Most Kindle users, however, have learned how to get their favorite books via Kindle deals. Featured in Kindle Daily Deals, monthly lists of discounted Kindle books or limited-time offers for hot shopping seasons (such as Prime Day or Cyber Monday), some Kindle bestsellers can be grabbed for prices cut to $3.99 or below.

Frequent price cuts are not a part of the audiobook world. Sure, Audible and other audiobook platforms offer daily deals similar to Kindle Daily Deal or Nook Daily Find. However, massive audiobook deals are not offered that often and are usually not that deep as the ones on ebooks.

If you are determined to hunt for discounted audiobooks, make sure to check out deal sections in popular audiobook stores:

Audible Sales & Deals – the page showcases current daily deal, free listens, and great audiobooks under $7 or $15. Plus, you can find here information about deals on Audible subscription plans,

Kobo Audiobook deals – you can find here not only one or two featured books (priced between $2.99 and $4.99), but also discounted or cheap audiobooks in popular genres, such as romance, thrillers, or fantasy,

Google Play Audiobooks – the store doesn’t offer daily deals yet, but you can check out currently free audiobooks (don’t get too excited, there are only few titles here),

There are many ways to listen to audiobooks

The times when the primary way to listen to audiobooks was a CD player are over.

Now, audiobooks, just like ebooks or music, can be downloaded and listened to on most devices: tablets, smartphones, or e-readers.

In most cases, the only thing to do is to download to your device a relevant audiobook application. We list the best ones for iOS and Android at the end of this section.

It seems that one smart home gadget is more suitable for playing audiobooks than any other device. It’s a smart speaker.

Several models are available on the market, naming only Amazon Echo, Google Home, or Apple HomePod. Why are they better audiobook players than tablets or phones? Because you can start an audiobook with just your voice.

Just imagine. You’re coming back home, and the first thing you say is “Alexa, resume my audiobook.”

Top audiobook apps for Android

Top audiobook apps for iPad and iPhone

Audiobooks can be purchased or subscribed

As we’ve already discussed, audiobooks are more (sometimes much more) expensive than ebooks and print books. When seeing a price set between $20 and $30, you’ll think twice before hitting the “Buy” button.

Fortunately, audiobooks can be bought not only the traditional way (paying separately for each one) but also in a subscription model.

For instance, in an Audible membership program, you can get one credit per month for a free audiobook regardless of its price. Plus you can save up to 30% in exclusive member audiobook deals.

After you sign up for Audible subscription, you get two free audiobooks for a good start. After 30 days of free trial, you will pay $14.95 per month. It roughly equals half of the price of a bestselling audiobook.

Audiobook subscriptions

There is another – and in my opinion much better way – to get access to interesting audiobooks. I’m talking about subscription services that give access to different benefits – and one of them is an ability to listen to audiobooks.

Multi-benefit subscriptions that include audiobooks

Amazon Prime – this powerful $12.99/month subscription platform includes two interesting services. Audible Channels gives access to original audio editions of standout articles and news from top sources. Prime Reading lets you access a rotating list of Kindle books with Audible narration,

Scribd – a subscription-based platform dedicated to digital reading. For a monthly fee of $8.99 you will get an unlimited access to digital books, newspapers & magazines, documents, and audiobooks,

Kindle Unlimited – Amazon’s popular digital subscription, besides about 1.5 million Kindle books and magazines, gives also access to over 20,000 Audible narrations that you can seamlessly play in your ebooks.

Choose the audiobook platform wisely

Have you ever tried to switch the ebook platform? Decided to move all your Kobo books to Kindle ecosystem or the other way round?

If yes, be prepared for similar pain when it comes to audiobooks.

The reason is that different audiobook platforms use DRM (Digital Rights Management) systems to prevent bought files from the unauthorized distribution.

It means that most probably the audiobook you download from one platform can be only opened using apps and devices authorized by this platform.

Example

When you buy an audiobook on Audible, you can open it with an Audible iPhone app or an Audible app for Amazon Fire tablet. If you try to open it with Google Play Books app on your Android tablet, you won’t succeed.

Therefore, it’s essential to spend some time to check out and compare audiobook stores, pick up a few best ones, and compare them in detail.

Here are some suggestions:

check out how many of the books from your wishlist are available as audiobooks,

compare prices of your favorite books,

find out what are the ways to access your bought audiobooks,

compare audiobook apps available for the device you plan to use as an audiobook player,

check out conditions and features each platform offers (deals, subscriptions, coupons, etc.)

You can switch between reading an ebook and playing and audiobooks

The last thing shows how tremendous are the possibilities of books that are converted to a digital format.

Have you heard of Whispersync for Voice? It’s a technology developed by Amazon, which lets Kindle users add audiobook companions to their Kindle books, and enjoy following the story either by reading or listening to it.

How does it work? Imagine you start reading a book in the evening on your iPad, using a Kindle app.

When you wake up in the morning and go out jogging, you can use the Kindle app on your iPhone – but this time switch the mode to audiobook playing. The narration will start precisely at the location you stopped at last night. Cool, huh?

Audiobook narration is an option available for over 60,000 Kindle titles. It’s not the same as the audiobook bought in the Audible store, although powered by Audible.

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